Actor Jennifer Marshall didn’t reprise her role as Max Mayfield’s (Sadie Sink) mother in Stranger Things Season 5, and now she’s turning to the fandom to come up with an answer behind her absence in the show’s final chapter.
The fifth season of the show brought an end to the pop culture behemoth almost a decade after it originally started airing on Netflix back in 2016. It arguably became the streamer’s flagship series, and is consistently one of the platform’s most watched shows of all time. The final episode aired on New Year’s Eve and was met with mixed reviews, with some fans even theorizing that it was a fake-out and the “real” finale would arrive on January 7.
The Conformity Gate theory suggested that Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) created an illusion of a happy ending to mess with both the Hawkins gang and the audience. But believers were left disappointed when the secret episode failed to materialize.
Fans weren’t the only ones disappointed by Stranger Things Season 5, as actor Jennifer Marshall took to Instagram to voice her disappointment that she wasn’t brought back as Max’s mother.
Jennifer Marshall thinks its weird Max’s mother wasn’t there for her in Stranger Things Season 5
Shortly after the Stranger Things Season 5 finale aired on Netflix, Marshall took to Instagram on January 1 to joke about where Susan Hargrove was while Max, her daughter, was in a coma in hospital. She wrote: “Okay folks! It’s over… but where was she? What kind of mother isn’t there for her child while she’s in the hospital? Give me all your theories…”
In the comments, fans were quick to criticize Netflix and the Duffer Brothers for not including Susan in the final season, although one person pointed out that Susan was shown as an alcoholic in previous seasons and that could be the reason behind her absence.
They explained: “She was an alcoholic and knew her daughter was in a coma. Alcoholics, from my experience, don’t do difficult things like visiting loved ones in hospitals or doing the difficult emotional things, and if they do, they always show up drunk. Not their fault, their brains don’t regulate correctly.”
Others suggested that Vecna killed Susan off-screen so that Max was isolated as part of his grand plan, and someone else suggested that the government kept her quiet.
Jennifer Marshall wanted to be in the final season to get health insurance after having cancer
Marshall also revealed the heartbreaking reason she wanted to be in Stranger Things Season 5, explaining that she had cancer but was in remission while the final season was being filmed — and it would’ve helped her get health insurance through the Screen Actor’s Guild.
“I had cancer, I get it. But I was in remission during the shooting of Season 5,” she wrote on Instagram on January 7. “Shooting would have helped me obtain my health insurance through the union. Maybe they had too many characters, idk but obv Susan Hargrove is THE WORST MOTHER EVER LMAO.”
The star later gave a statement to People and called Susan “the opportunity of a lifetime,” and explained that she doesn’t know why she wasn’t included in the last season.
“It would have helped me not only financially, but would have been a mental and emotional uplift after battling cancer for almost two years. Either way, no one is entitled to a role, cancer or not,” she continued. “My heart remains grateful, and I will always give those involved in the decision-making the benefit of the doubt.”
